Amazon chief executive Jeff Bezos has said the world's largest online retailer
would open physical stores if it could find a way of making them unique.

"We want to do something that is uniquely Amazon," said Mr Bezos. "If we can find that idea - and we haven't found it yet - but if we can find that idea, we would love to open physical stores."

Amazon's success as an online retailer is reshaping the way consumers shop and exerting huge pressure on those brick and mortar retailers.

In the US, retailers including Best Buy, the biggest seller of consumer electronics, are shutting stores as other chains try to find ways to increase their online sales without hurting their physical stores.

In Britain, a slew of retailers are shutting shops and investing more in their online operations. The electronics retailer Comet put some of the blame for its demise last month on the growth of online retailing.

Mr Bezos, who founded Amazon in 1994, told the Charlie Rose programme that "the question we would always have before we would embark on such a thing is 'what's the idea?'" He added "what would we do that would be different? How would it be better?"